Once, beyond the forest, where even the birds drink water on their knees, a long time ago, back when you could drink from a wheel rut and every yard had a well with a sweep, back then, I too had beautiful brown hair like yours. It was also when the gallows hill at the edge of the village wasn't so steep. This strange event happened to me in those days. The poor man always took care of his animals because he had so few. My mother's chickens were guarded and chased around the yard all day by a cocky rooster, and sometimes it would chase me too. In the back yard, the hens often perched on the billy goat to cluck. I asked my mother why the rooster chased the chickens, and she simply replied that they were playing, as they loved to chase each other. I understood because we also loved playing tag. One day, the rooster stepped on a thorn and limped around the yard from then on. My mother dipped the rooster's foot in ashes, which healed it. To grow wiser, I asked my parents many difficult questions. If I received a thorough answer, I had no more questions that day, but that never happened. My father often remarked how exhausting I was. Nowadays, my wife says the same thing quite often. If I asked my father something, he would always say, "Go ask your mother; she knows the answer." So I would go and ask her my wise questions right away. "What is the rooster doing on the hen's back?" "He's traveling." "Why?" "Because he stepped on a thorn, and now his foot hurts!" "Look, Mother, now another hen is carrying our limping rooster on her back!" "Why?" "Because the first one got tired!" I didn't understand why he was making the hens carry him around, even after his foot had healed, but my mother said they were playing. One day, when it was my turn to watch over the poultry, I saw the rooster heading into the nettles. I didn't need any more encouragement; I grabbed a bag and gave him a good whack on the bottom, explaining wisely that his foot had just healed, and the last thing he needed was to get stung by nettles and then make the hens carry him around again like before. But despite my careful watch, our rooster's foot always seemed to hurt because he constantly sat on the hens' backs. Then, one day, I saw my mother cutting the wing tips off the hens and the rooster with scissors. I immediately launched my wise questions: "Why?" "So they won't fly away." "Do you see that stork in the sky?" "Our hens would fly away too, and they'd take the eggs with them." Since I loved fried eggs, there was no need to elaborate further. The hens laid many eggs, and I saw my mother gathering them into her apron to bring them inside to the pantry, so I decided to try it too, thinking I was a big boy now. Although I occasionally dropped one because it rolled out of my undershirt, I carefully hid the evidence, and my accomplice in this was Pluto, our dog. One day, the neighbor's dog, who always came over to play with our dog, took one of our hens. I heard my father telling my mother that the neighbor had dealt with their dog. After that, I didn't see the neighbor's dog anymore, so I quickly asked my mother: "Where did it go?" "You see, my son, it stole the hen and, out of shame, it ran away to the ends of the earth." "And the hen?" "It took that with it too." "So they ran away together?" "Indeed," my mother said. Gradually, we ran out of hens until only one hen, which constantly hiccuped, remained. My mother said it was brooding. My mother told my father to give it some water to stop the hiccups, which made sense because when I had hiccups and drank a glass of water, it stopped. But instead of giving it a drink, my father poured a bucket of cold water over it, which made me laugh. I explained to my father that he should have given it a drink, not poured water over it. Strangely, the cold shower cured the hen, and it stopped hiccupping, so it became the guest of honor at our Sunday lunch. The next Sunday, it was the limping rooster's turn, even though by then, it wasn't limping anymore.
Meanwhile, Pluto, our dog, dug himself a large hole under the chicken coop, where he made himself comfortable, protecting himself from the cold in winter and the heat in summer, as he had a thick, heavy coat that was unbearable in the 40-degree heat of August. Three weeks had passed since we butchered the brooding hen. One morning, while doing my usual patrol of the yard, I saw Pluto walking toward me with three little chicks chirping behind him. "Where did these come from?" I asked my mother wisely. "Maybe from the neighbor's," she replied. "Go tell Aunt Ica to count her chicks!" I ran over in a panic, and Aunt Ica nearly had a heart attack, not knowing what was wrong. She counted her chicks—they were all there. It turned out that Pluto had hatched the eggs that had rolled under the chicken coop during the summer heat. The neighbors were amazed; they couldn't believe their eyes. On Sunday, after church, the gossiping women sat on the bench in front of our house—every house had a bench in front where gossip spread—and discussed what had happened. Some even claimed to know that not only had Pluto hatched the eggs, but he had laid them too! When Pluto lay down under the arbor, his chicks snuggled up next to him. When the dog was given food, the chicks also got some mash in another dish. They often went over to eat from Pluto's dish, and while he would growl a bit, seeing how much food they were eating, he let them eat, and we thought he was sick, but there was nothing wrong with him. He was a special dog. When my father left for the factory in the morning, Pluto would accompany him to the corner every day, watching until my father disappeared around the next corner, then he would slowly make his way back to his chicks. At two o'clock, when the factory whistle blew, Pluto would jump up and head to the street corner, sit there, and watch the approaching people. When he spotted my father, he would leap with joy, wait patiently until my father reached him, then they would walk home together. But one day, everything changed. Pluto heard the factory whistle and headed to the corner. The people came, but my father wasn't among them. The neighbors, who were returning from the factory, patted Pluto's head and told him, "Go home, little dog," but he didn't budge—he just waited. The neighbor lady, who knew the dog well, was the last to come down the road. With tears in her eyes, she hugged Pluto and told him that his master wouldn't be coming home anymore. "Come, Pluto, let's go home," she said. The dog sensed the pain in her voice, understood what she was trying to tell him, and after looking back at the road once more, he followed her home. A few days later, Pluto passed away on the porch. We buried him under the hundred-year-old walnut tree, where he loved to lie at his master's feet while he read the newspaper on the bench. The walnut tree is still there, and when I look at it, this old story comes to mind.
Nincsenek megjegyzések:
Megjegyzés küldése